Hood and Morris utilized an isolation tank to provide a setting in which the elicitation of imagery could be facilitated. The isolation tank was 7.5 feet long, 4 feet high, and 4 feet wide. The tank contained a hydrated magnesium sulfate solution with a density of 1.30 grams/cc, a depth of 10 inches, and a temperature of 34.1°C (approximate external body temperature). Participants were totally enclosed in the tank, which was also soundproofed and lightproofed. The tank itself was in a small soundproofed room. Participants were nude in the tank and floated there for 1 hour.

A person can expect a variety of imagery phenomena under isolation conditions, including geometric forms, light, and images of meaningful figures. As part of the appropriate ethical concerns in doing such research, participants were forewarned to anticipate such experiences. However, the participants were also instructed to try to control their images.

In a double-blind procedure, half the participants were instructed to try to imagine religious figures, situations, and settings, while the other half were instructed to try to imagine cartoon figures, situations, and settings. Thus, the researchers attempted to encourage specific imagery among religious types, for whom such imagery should be relevant. Furthermore, it was predicted that intrinsic persons would report more religious imagery, based upon the assumption that their participation in religion would be more devoutly experientially based than that of extrinsics. Twenty intrinsic and twenty extrinsic participants had been selected for their extreme scores on either the Intrinsic or Extrinsic Religious Orientation Scale.^a  The results of this study are presented in the table below.

Inspection of this table reveals that there was no overall tendency for either religious group to report more imagery when the images were those well documented to occur under isolation conditions (e.g., geometric forms, meaningful figures, light). However, under the set conditions intrinsic persons reported more cued religious imagery than extrinsics, whereas the groups did not differ on cartoon imagery.^b  Thus, the report of more religious imagery under cued conditions was not a function of the intrinsics' greater tendency to report imagery. Indeed, the intrinsics even reported more religious imagery under the cartoon cue than extrinsics reported under the religious cue. That these results were not simply functions of demand characteristics -- with intrinsics more sensitive to reporting more religious imagery when cued -- was supported by a control study in which intrinsics did not report more religiously relevant imagery than extrinsics when asked to give religious responses to Rorschach cards.

REFERENCES

Hood, R. W., Jr., & Morris, R. J. (1981b). Sensory isolation and the differential elicitation of religious imagery in intrinsic and extrinsic persons. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 20, 261-273.